Sunday, May 24, 2009

... and it is drinking. It has recently been quoted to say: Just being alive should make you late for everything. In case you've never noticed, the dead are always on time.

Time, including the passage of, is all in the mind of strange moving creatures. Hence, since the last blog entry, no time has passed at all and there is no need to feel sheepish and hide under the table.

• Have cloned myself on Facebook — for the gaming purposes — and have begun to exist as my clone 95% of the time. At some point, I removed my clone from my friends list because of her insistent game invites. It's sad, but true: I'm longer FB friends with myself.

Having multiple FB identities is probably the modern way to experience split personalities since only one consciousness (per browser) can be dominant at a time. Hee. It's a rather confusing experience.

• Last Friday the potato chips and nuts that my sister mailed me on 11 December 2008 finally arrived. The box had the seal of the Deparment of Health... as if to say this could be swine flu. The customs people even made me sign a month ago that I will be held responsible in case of an epidemic or something. Hee!

Incidentally, they have launched a poetry competition (no fees attached) with the Latitude Festival 2009. First prize includes a chance to read on the New Voices stage in the prestigious poetry tent at Latitude. Goal is to write a poem about where you live. More info at their website.

• Thieves Jargon plans to publish the cheeky poem, A Driving Instructor's First Experience with a Tango Teacher in an upcoming issue.

Submission mailed: 13 April 2009 E-mail reply: 9 May 2009

• Thanks to Liz for mailing me a gorgeous copy of The Stinging Fly, I decided to send them some work myself. They accepted two poems for publication in a future issue: Apple, Pear and the Body Running Through Them and Suffocation Prelude (sonnet).

They're currently closed to submissions now and will be open again from January 1st to March 31st.

Submission mailed: 19 January 2009 E-mail reply: 1 May 2009

• Weave Magazine — a literary print publication and organization based out of Pittsburgh — accepted a poem, Feeding the Husband for a future issue. Payment is one copy. Very quick response time, too!

Submission sent: 21 April 2009 Reply date: 29 April 2009

• DIAGRAM accepted a prose poem inspired by the James Castle exhibit in Philly, Unidentified dark object (with shoelace) for an upcoming issue.

Submission sent: 31 March 2009 Reply date: 29 April 2009

• Holly Rose Review accepted a poem, Things She Told the Rooster Before It Became Glass for the Passion issue (#2, June 2009).

Submission sent: 9 April 2009 Reply date: 11 April 2009

• Oranges & Sardines accepted three poems: The Girl in the Bathtub, Ownership, and Disconnection for an upcoming issue.

• Found out last April that my prose poem, Family was accepted for a future issue of Drunken Boat. Never thought I'd live to see the day... plus anything with the letters d-r-u-n-k in it makes my cuppa poison.

The downside is they can't seem to send me an e-mail. Have changed twice now and they've sent the acceptance e-mail twice, but nothing. They seem to have fairly quick response times... my advice is to just check your submission regularly on their database manager in case this should happen with your e-mail addy, too.

• Have six poems in the Fantasies issue of Succour — which went out on 11 May 2009. It's one of the print journals I've discovered through Facebook via friends of friends of friends. FB does have its neat uses. Poems list:

» The Self in the Mirror is a Test» Please Meet My Nails» I'm Only as Half-Drunk as You Think I Am» twelve: crackle (from approximative translations)» The dog in the rearview mirror» What the postwoman can't fight

Submission sent: 16 February 2009 Reply date: 28 March 2009

• The Summer 2009 issue of Rattle is out! People have been writing me to say, but — again — I still haven't gotten my copies. Will keep my fingers crossed that they get here before Christmas. My poem, Tonsillitis is in there aching.

They've also got a call for subs on Sonnets for the Winter 2009 issue. So get those da-DUM da-DUM nuts cracking.

• My first published flash, The Dreaming Lake came out in the March-April 2009 issue of Oak Ben Review.

• qarrsiluni published some poems and fiction that I co-wrote with Valerie:

About Me

Arlene Ang is the author of "The Desecration of Doves" (2005), "Secret Love Poems" (Rubicon Press, 2007), and a collaborative book with Valerie Fox, "Bundles of Letters Including A, V and Epsilon" (Texture Press, 2008). Her third full-length collection, "Seeing Birds in Church is a Kind of Adieu" was published by Cinnamon Press in 2010. Her poems have appeared in Ambit, Caketrain, Diagram, Poetry Ireland, Poet Lore, Rattle, Salt Hill as well as the Best of the Web anthologies 2008 and 2009 (Dzanc Books). She lives in Spinea, Italy where she serves as staff editor for The Pedestal Magazine and Press 1. Website: www.leafscape.org